| “ | Before tonight, they didn't know my name! But now... no one will forget it. | ” |
Robert "Bob" Adams was an "injustice collector"-type serial bomber, copycat of Randy Slade, and serial-turned-spree killer who appeared in the Season Seven episode of Criminal Minds, "Painless".
Background[]
"I was the only one brave enough to stare him down, but his bomb knocked me out, and when I woke up, there was Jerry on the TV telling my story! My story!"
Little is revealed about Adams' past, except he was a complete outsider at North Valley High School. On October 12, 2001, a student named Randy Slade carried out a massacre in the school's cafeteria, taking Adams and over a dozen other students hostage. Holding them at gunpoint, he dared them to look him in the eye. Those who couldn't were promptly shot. After killing two students this way, he dared Adams, who was the only one to actually look him in the eye. Slade didn't shoot him, saying he wasn't "worth a bullet". Slade then detonated an explosive device he had brought with him, killing himself and ten other students. Adams was among those injured by the blast, being knocked unconscious and wounded so badly that he developed a condition called pain asymbolia, which made him unable to suffer from physical pain. A few days after the massacre, Adams saw Jerry Holtz, a student who had also been present in the cafeteria and was forced by Slade to lock the doors, on television, claiming to have been the one who managed to look Slade in the eye. Doug Givens, the principal of North Valley high, arranged for Holtz and nine other students, recognized as a group at their school nicknamed the "Top Ten", to be the primary faces of the publicity of the massacre's survivors. Adams went on with his life, very resentful of the fact that Holtz had stolen his credit. In the fall of 2011, when a memorial service for the students killed in the massacre was to be held, Adams came back to Boise with a revenge plan in mind.
Painless[]
Adams starts by killing Principal Givens, with a bomb hidden in Givens's alarm clock, similar to Slade's. Adams then proceeds to target the members of the Top 10, killing Chelsea Grant second by crushing her throat and beating her to death. Adams confronts and attacks Jerry Holtz in a lonely hallway inside North Valley, after the latter is interviewed by the BAU, repeatedly demanding that he looks at him and breaking a glass case with his arm in anger. Unable to muster the courage to do so, Holtz yells, "I didn't know! I didn't know!" Adams simply replies, "That's the point! They're gonna find out!" He then murders him by beating him in a fit of rage. Later, he approaches Tiffany Gleason in a parking lot and learns from her that she and the rest of the surviving Top 10 members are holding a meeting at the Seven Stars restaurant.
Following her there, Adams places and then detonates a bomb at the main entrance, injuring the nearest patrons and waiters before entering the restaurant and holding Tiffany and the other Top 10 hostage, all the while ranting on about how he never got the credit for being the only one who stared down Slade. Hotch and Prentiss confront him as he holds Gleason at gunpoint, and they attempt to reason with Adams, telling him that only he could set the record straight. However, he flees, allowing Gleason and the others to escape. Hotch and Prentiss pursue him to the boiler room, where Adams tries to shoot the former, only to be shot by him. However, the gunshot wound isn't fatal, and Adams grabs a large wrench, snarling, "That...didn't...hurt!" He then charges at Hotch, only to be shot again, this time fatally. The memorial service proceeds just as initially planned.
Modus Operandi[]
"Can you look at me in the eye, Jerry?! Huh?! Look at me! Look at me! Look at me, LOOK AT ME!"
Adams targeted people connected to North Valley High and the Top 10 survivors of Slade's massacre. His first victim, Principal Doug Givens, whose death was apparently meant to be a kind of compact copycat act based on Slade's killings, was first shot in the leg with a Smith & Wesson Model 5904 to prevent him from fleeing and then killed by a bomb hidden in his alarm clock modeled after Slade's design. Chelsea Grant and Jerry Holtz were both savagely beaten to death with his bare fists, with Grant's neck being crushed first to prevent her from yelling for help, while Holtz (who was the source of his anger) was struck and incapacitated with a fire extinguisher first. Also, Adams asked Principal Givens and Jerry Holtz if they could look him in the eye, just like Slade did, before killing them, though with Holtz, he did it more aggressively due to his rage against him. After bombing the entrance of the Seven Stars restaurant (a way of making an entrance), he held the former Top 10 members hostage with the handgun, forced them to guess his name, and threatened to shoot them if they got it wrong. When he attempted to kill Hotch, he tried to shoot him with the same handgun, then bludgeon him with a wrench after he had been shot and dropped his gun.
Profile[]
"Was it that hard...for you people...to tell the truth about me? Huh? To notice me?!"
Perpetrators of school violence are often sophisticated with their weapons; while Slade carried his bomb in his backpack, the unsub hid his own bomb in Givens' clock radio. He is also progressive, and a loner by default, not by choice, and this fills him with boiling rage. He tried multiple times to join social groups but was rejected each time. He has a sense of control and is working towards an endgame. Slade's pathology revolved around the big kill. The unsub could have done the same, but didn't, which meant that there is no "blaze of glory fantasy". The unsub has more bombs made after killing Givens but is savoring his next attack for the big kill, which is the meeting of the Top 10 members. The unsub's vendetta has nothing to do with Slade's hit list as first thought and he didn't appear to be Slade's partner trying to reclaim credit. His hatred manifested itself when the names on the hit list emerged from the cafeteria as heroes in the media, and now, he wants to finish the job that Slade had started. Emotionally, the memorial is more like a high school reunion to the unsub.
The unsub is also tied to the school in some way, like a student, a family member of one of the victims killed in the massacre, or a groupie. However, he was quickly ruled out as a groupie, because the unsub tricked Givens into blowing himself up, and a groupie wouldn't have showed such a high degree of control. Seconds before murdering Jerry Holtz, he smashed a glass case as a show of force, an action that would injure him. Empathy is developed by sharing pain, and because the unsub was not able to feel pain, this empathy was cut off.
Based on his M.O. and the motivations for his crimes, Adams can be considered a disorganized mission-oriented type serial killer.
Real-Life Comparison[]
Adams is similar to Kipland Kinkel - Both were murderers an (attempted in Kinkel's case) bombers diagnosed with neurological problems before their crime sprees, planted a bomb inside a home during one of their murders (though Kinkel's failed to detonate), injured at least one victim with an American-made pistol, killed one student at their high school in a hallway, committed their largest attacks at a place where their fellow students ate, made statements at the ends of their sprees worded with some sort of hopelessness, and bear resemblance to each other in appearance.
Known Victims[]
- 2011:
- October 10: Doug Givens (the school principal; non-fatally shot in the right leg, then killed by a SEMTEX bomb)
- October 11: Chelsea Grant (a former Top 10 member; crushed her neck, then beat her to death with his bare hands)
- October 12:
- Jerry Holtz (another former Top 10 member; struck across the face with a fire extinguisher, then beaten to death like the previous victim)
- The attack at the Seven Stars restaurant:
- At least six unnamed patrons and waiters (all injured by the bomb Robert used to enter the restaurant)
- Held the following Top 10 members hostage and presumably intended to kill them:
- Tiffany Gleason (later held at gunpoint)
- James (surname indiscernible)
- William Coldridge
- Donald Jackson or Miles Gilliam[1]
- Ian Greenberg
- Khiara Freels
- Steve Bronson
- Caleb Brown
- Aaron Hotchner (attempted to shoot, then bludgeon with a wrench)
Notes[]
- Adams appears to be partly inspired by the waves of criminals trying and failing to commit copycat attempted rampage killings modelled off the Columbime High School massacre committed by Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, most notably on anniversaries of the mass murder.
- Adams had a high tolerance for pain, smashing his hand through the glass sheet of a trophy case with no visible damage, and taking multiple gunshots before finally dying. This makes Robert Adams the fourth of seven unsubs the BAU have apprehended that displayed a high tolerance for pain. The other six are:
- Season Three
- Jonny McHale ("True Night") - A serial-turned-spree killer and vigilante who withstood being hit by a car, was able to brutally slay six armed men, with one of them shooting him.
- Season Four
- Vincent Rowlings ("The Big Wheel") - A prolific serial killer who was shot at point-blank range by a gangbanger, yet still managed to stab him unhindered by the gunshot (but still died hours later).
- Season Six
- Rhett Walden ("Reflection of Desire") - A necrophiliac, abductor, and budding serial killer who was still able to carry his mother's corpse, despite being shot by Hotch at close range.
- Season Twelve
- Kevin Decker ("Scarecrow") - A delusional serial killer who was stabbed in the back with shears by his last would-be victim, but still managed to remove the shears; he was also able to go after the girl, catch her and try to drown her in a trough.
- Trey Gordon ("In the Dark") - A serial-turned-spree killer and sniper who was able to walk barefoot on broken glass and still managed to slaughter a couple while sleepwalking. When he woke up, he only seemed mildly irritated by the glass cuts. He also has a medical explanation for his pain tolerance.
- Season Thirteen
- Gabriel Merza ("Blue Angel") - A serial killer and former hitman who was stabbed in the back and was still able to attack Matthew Simmons unobstructed, also not treating the stab wound at all.
- However, Adams is the first of them to have a proper explanation for his pain tolerance.
- Gabriel Merza ("Blue Angel") - A serial killer and former hitman who was stabbed in the back and was still able to attack Matthew Simmons unobstructed, also not treating the stab wound at all.
- Season Three
- Eric Jungmann, the actor who portrayed Adams, also portrayed a bomber in the procedural drama NCIS: Los Angeles.
Appearances[]
References[]
- ↑ When the Top 10's pictures are shown in the episode, Donald Jackson's picture is replaced by Miles Gilliam's from one scene to the next, leaving it unknown which is true.